iCloud will be free, and is due to arrive this autumn
During the keynote address at the Worldwide Developers Conference, Apple CEO Stevejobs unveiled iCloud, Apple's new wireless data sync service for iOS devices, Macs, and PCs. "Some people think the cloud is just a hard disk in the sky," Jobs told the attendees. "We think it's way more than that. And we call it iCloud."
iCloud will be a free service, and replaces Apple's MobileMe, which Jobs admitted: "Wasn't our finest hour." Like MobileMe, iCloud offers the ability to sync contacts, calendars, and mail across devices. Create a new contact on your iPhone, for example, and it will be automatically pushed to the cloud, which then syncs to all of your devices and computers. iCloud syncing also works with Safari bookmarks, books in iBooks, and even third-party applications can store documents in iCloud and auto-sync them when changes are made on any device.
Copies in the sky
iCloud will back up important content to the cloud over Wi-Fi, including purchased music, apps, books, photos, videos, device settings, and app data. Apple said that if you ever get a new phone, you will be able to type in your Apple ID and password, and everything will be loaded onto the phone automatically. Each iCloud userwill get 5GB of free storage for mail, documents and backup. Fortunately, purchased music, apps, books, and photos don't count against that total.
Apple has created three new apps for iCloud, Documents in the Cloud (foriWorks documents), Photo Stream (lets you take photos on any device and automatically upload them to other devices), and iTunes in the Cloud, (songs you've already purchased from the iTunes store are available for free on up to 10 devices). There will be a new Purchased button
Multiple devices iCloud lets you access your music on all of your devices,
that shows you your entire purchase history of songs, purchased on any device. You can then re-download any song or album with the touch of a button.
"This is the first time we've seen this in the music industry," said Stevejobs. "No charge for multiple downloads on many devices."
For music that wasn't purchased from the iTunes store, such as songs you've ripped from a CD, Apple has come up with iTunes Match. The service scans your iTunes library and tries to match it with some of the 18 million songs that Apple sells. For the songs that Apple can't find, you can upload them yourself manually. iTunes Match will only be available in the US at launch, priced $25 peryear.
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